Yep...these cheap and easy radios are cool toys, until someone interferes with a frequency they have no business on. The invisible barrier is no longer a barrier. Back in the day, you had to work hard to get a radio you could somehow program (or it took crystals!) to get a specific frequency into...and that usually meant getting a radio tech to do it after the shop closed. Fewer people have appreciation for the "sacred" rules of radio. You don't put the local cops frequency in your radio, unless you are a cop. Kids know computers, like many of us knew radios at that age, these radios are just a software addressable devices. Kids will play.

Yep...these cheap and easy radios are cool toys, until someone interferes with a frequency they have no business on. The invisible barrier is no longer a barrier. Back in the day, you had to work hard to get a radio you could somehow program (or it took crystals!) to get a specific frequency into...and that usually meant getting a radio tech to do it after the shop closed. Fewer people have appreciation for the "sacred" rules of radio. You don't put the local cops frequency in your radio, unless you are a cop. Kids know computers, like many of us knew radios at that age, these radios are just a software addressable devices. Kids will play.

I can't say I don't have local police bands programmed into my radios. The difference here is my radios have transmit locked out when on these channels. Not that I would transmit intentionally, but I want to prevent accidental key ups.

Amateur radio operators and to an extent, GMRS radio operators, have assisted in disaster communications for many years. I have maintained an IG class license specifically for first responder activities. In my many years of commercial operations, I have yet to find a situation where it was absolutely necessary to DIRECTLY communicate with anyone outside of my own license parameters. If communications are needed to suppliment Public Safety comm in a disaster, I get permission to place one of my trained volunteer team members in the local Comm Center with a portable and charger and RELAY info through our volunteer to their dispatcher. This is the ONLY way that we operate in a disaster scenario so as not to disrupt normal Public Safety communications with any type of "who is that on my radio system?" issue.

There may be instances in regional situations that might require direct comm, but that would be a last resort in most scenarios.

The radios in question are Chinese import radios that are “unlocked” to extend through the entire band.

The system in question is: WQQK520, which is licensed to Chaveirim Volunteer Services, Inc., on 461/466.9875 MHz.

461.9875 IS NOT a pubic safety frequency under the current rules and is afforded no protection in any such manner that a public safety licensee would be. Additionally, it is licensed for an incredibly high effective radiated power from a 160 ft. water tank. The system is licensed for analog FM, wide and narrow NXDN, and DMR (the combination of NXDN and DMR in the same radio or repeater is currently impossible).

1)Children don’t get these things on their own. The radios in question are programmed on frequency, have the appropriate input offset, and the appropriate squelch code. This seems more like parents involved or maybe formerly involved in Chaveirim left the radios around or gave them to their children when they were no longer needed. I highly doubt that children (I’m thinking pre-teens) have the faculties to program and configure this particular frequency/access combination into anything without parental involvement.

2)One must understand how frequency coordinators work. For 90.20 services, frequency coordinators SHOULD make their applicants define an area of operation. Sometimes the area of operation is unrealistic, like a one square mile town that is asking for a 25 mile radius to operate within, or for countywide coverage. Other times, the “AOP” is accurate for regular operations. The frequency coordinator attempts to find the frequency or frequencies where the system may operate with the least intrusion to other on or adjacent to them. In NJ, that’s usually impossible and “the best of the worst” is provided. In business, there is no such protection. Frequencies are assigned on the basis of mobile loading. So, it is possible to have six repeaters in very close proximity to each other and the FCC expects “shared use” of the resources (and has a requirement in the Rules about mandatory monitoring prior to transmission). In real life, 461.9875 MHz gets zero protection, so, had the children not been playing on the radios, it would be entirely possible that Giuseppi the Plumber, Town Florist, King Wok Delivery, and all kinds of other commercial operators would license up on the same frequency in the same area. Chaveirim would then be required to share the channel (but NOT the repeater, unless they leased facilities).

There does not appear to be incursion on to any Lakewood municipal or Ocean County services.

Well we actually can't blame the radio company but to those who have surplus gears they want to get rid off and they use the flea market to do it. The sad part is that they do not explain the proper use of the radio and thats where the problens lie.
(JUST NOTICED THIS IS A 5YRS OLD THREAD BUT JUST WANT TO PUT MY TWO CENTS IN)
Alberto
WRCC719